


Marry Me

by Kittenshift17



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: F/M, Idiots in Love, Marriage, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-18 20:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28998339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kittenshift17/pseuds/Kittenshift17
Summary: “Are you saying you wouldn’t be happy with me, Zuko?” she demanded.“I’m saying you’d suffer if you were forced into that role, and I won’t do that to you,” he said stubbornly.“So... you don’t want to marry me?” she said, and here her voice grew small and fragile with the sting of rejection.“I didn’t say that,” he sighed, eyeing her over the rim of his whiskey glass. “I said I don’t want to force you to be Fire Lady.”Her eyes widened.“So... were you not Fire Lord...” she began leadingly.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 260





	Marry Me

“What do you want, Katara?” Fire Lord Zuko snarled as he stormed down the corridor with an annoying Waterbender trailing along in his wake.

She huffed.

“I want you to be happy, Zuko!” she hissed. “Can’t you see that?”

“Katara,” he growled, glaring over his shoulder but not stopping on the way to his office, needing to get out of the corridor and into a hallway before anyone could see them arguing. Again.

“Am I wrong in thinking you’re not happy?” she demanded, stomping behind him and slamming the door when he stalked into his office with her right on his tail.

“You’re being ridiculous,” he growled, rounding his desk and pouring himself a healthy glass of whiskey.

“If you’re really, truly happy, Zuko, then tell me now, and I’ll walk out that door and never bring it up again,” Katara declared, leaning her hands on his desk from the far side of it, ever his adversary, always pushing him when she should leave things be.

Zuko downed his whiskey in one and poured another glass.

“I’m perfectly comfortable,” he told her, refusing to meet her eyes.

“That’s not what I asked you,” she smirked because damn it all, she knew he wasn’t happy. Of course, he wasn’t. He wanted her and instead, he was being forced into a betrothal with another woman because custom and tradition demanded it.

“Drop it, Katara,” he warned her.

“I won’t,” she shook her head. “You’re letting these pompous old windbags force you into a life you don’t want with a woman you can’t stand and I will _not_ stand idly by and just let that happen, Zuko. Fire Lord or not.”

“What choice do I have?” he demanded. “I have to marry, Katara. Within the year, or they’ll take my crown.”

“So marry,” she shrugged.

“That was the plan,” he rolled his eyes. “Hence... the betrothal.”

She scowled at him, breathing hard and there it was, gaping between them like so much empty air and fizzing with all the things they’d never dared say to one another. Zuko wondered if she would dare speak into that void. He wondered if she was brave enough. He wondered if he was. Narrowing her eyes, she huffed at him in fury.

“Marry _me_ , Zuko,” she demanded quietly.

And there is was. The thing they hadn’t dared to say to one another since the law about the Fire Lord taking a bride within a year of the coronation in order to keep his crown finally spewed into the space keeping them apart.

“You didn’t want to be Fire Lady,” he reminded her. “What use is making me happy in marriage if _you_ won’t be?”

Her eyes widened in surprise.

“That’s why you haven’t asked me?” she asked incredulously. “Because I... Zuko, I said that months and months ago.”

“You said that you couldn’t think of a worse fate than being Fire Lady and that you wouldn’t have blamed my mother for whatever crimes she’d committed to escape my father and her responsibilities as his wife,” he hissed.

She simply stared at him, a little dumbfounded.

“You... I said that _specifically_ referring to your mother and father’s scenario, you idiot!” she exclaimed. “As in, were I in your mother shoes and forced into a marriage with someone as evil as your father, I’d have done anything to flee. Not as in, I never want to be Fire Lady ever in my life, like say, maybe when a new, better, kind Fire Lord in the shape of my best friend comes forth.”

Zuko’s brow furrowed.

“But I want _you_ to be happy,” he said. “You wouldn’t be happy as Fire Lady, Katara. It’s all meetings and high teas and political galas with the other Fire Nation royals and ambassadors.”

Katara raised her eyebrows.

“Are you saying _you_ wouldn’t be happy with me, Zuko?” she demanded.

“I’m saying you’d suffer if you were forced into that role, and I won’t do that to you,” he said stubbornly.

“So... you don’t want to marry me?” she said, and here her voice grew small and fragile with the sting of rejection.

“I didn’t say that,” he sighed, eyeing her over the rim of his whiskey glass. “I said I don’t want to force you to be Fire Lady.”

Her eyes widened.

“So... were you not Fire Lord...” she began leadingly.

“I’d have already bungled a proposal that you probably would have turned down on principle for how bad it would undoubtedly have been,” he answered honestly.

Katara looked at the floor, her fingers playing with the cap on her water-pouch like she was thinking about bending at him. Her shoulders were tight and Zuko feared he’d offended her, or maybe disgusted her. They weren’t and had never actually been a couple, no matter his idle fantasies.

“You really are an idiot, you know?” she said to the carpet in front of his desk.

“Excuse me?” 

She looked up at him, the corners of her mouth twitching like she wanted to laugh.

“Don’t you think that if I didn’t think I’d be happy with you, forced to play Fire Lady or not, I’d have left the Fire Nation months ago?” she asked him. “Don’t you think... don’t you _know_ after everything we’ve been through that as long as you’re next to me, I’ll be happy? Have you not figured that out yet?”

Zuko stared at her, his heart pounding inside his chest, because agni, this had to be a dream, didn’t it? She didn’t feel for him what he felt for her. She never had. If she had, she would’ve said something when he suggested Mai as his wife even though the gloomy girl hadn’t been his girlfriend in ages and hadn’t enjoyed being it when she was.

“You... _want_ to be Fire Lady?” he asked her quietly. “With the crown and the stares and the responsibilities and forever being in the spotlight and the boring meetings and the fancy, dull dinners?”

“I want _you_ , Zuko,” she answered quietly. “Even if all those things come along with whatever I have to do to get you... to keep you. I... please don’t marry Mai, Zuko. Marry me. Please?”

Zuko thought his heart might explode.

“Aren’t I supposed to ask you?” he said. “Isn’t that customary?”

She rolled her eyes.

“Like you wouldn’t have made it the most awkward thing ever?” she challenged, smirking.

Zuko’s lips twitched. Yeah. He really needed to work on being less awkward.

“You really want to marry me?” he asked, rounding his desk slowly and setting down his empty glass as he went.

“Even if I have to dance naked in a barrel of ungai singing the Ode to the Fire Nation song,” Katara nodded, her eyes filling. 

“How did you find out about the ceremony specifics?” he teased, laughing as he reached her, his hands lifting to cup her cheeks.

Katara laughed as the first tears of happiness slid down her cheeks and Zuko claimed her lips for their first delirious kiss, already planning to make sure he never had to kiss any other woman ever again.


End file.
